Leader Aficionados Gifts

'I'm Attila, you know, the Hun.'

Businesswoman Empowerment

'You could be a constant inspiration for us to come up with a plan to get a leg up on our competition...you're hired!'

"I don't like getting bogged down in details. I'm more of a big-picture guy."

How leaders fail

"He's not really much of a leader...he just has a lot of followers."

"Hmmm ... that's interesting. Now, what about ideas that don't suck - do you have any of those?"

"I can motivate everyone except myself."

"The president demands that staff take responsibility for failures, and the multi-trillion deficit is down to YOU!"

"I'm sorry, but we're looking for someone who's more likely to be followed than following."

"Serendipity is not a strategy."

Feedback should be sought for genuine reasons, not because you want compliments. . .

'I give this one about three months...'

'I have been hearing some disturbing comments about you, Parker, some of your employees think you're a nice guy!'

'The ultimate sign of success is when no one puts you on hold.'

"C'mon people! All for me and me for me!"

Harry S. Truman

Barack Obama's To Do list.

"Do you have a minute, Bob? I'd like to speak with you about the concept of 'leadership'."

'I delegate, then I follow up.'

'...And for the low visibility positions we can bring people on board who can, you know...do things.'

"The GOOD news is that 94 people want to attend the leadership training, the bad news is that 64 of them want to change the venue, 56 the time and 45 want to be course leader."

Someone needs to tell him that having Churchillian leadership skills requires more than a 10'' havana

'I tried that approach once, but my employees seized the carrots and attacked me with sticks.'

'I like to greet the new team members myself.'

"Leadership ISN'T just about trying to be BETTER than everyone else!"

The little engine that could delegate.

'This is impressive, Roberts, but I'm not sure that it qualifies as work-place leadership.'

"The team needs LEADERSHIP, anyone have a view on that?"

"Remember, Man of good Sense not here to do work on your behalf. Man of good Sense only here to help you on strategic level until you wise enough to overcome recession."

"If we're a team, the manager should take the heat!"

'We had no contingency plan for things going right.'

"He's got great leadership skills. Wherever he's taking us, it's got to be better than where we've been."

'It's really lonely at the top of a dot.com company.'

'I started as an office boy and growled my way to the top.'